The present invention relates to a device for masking image data and, more particularly, to an image data masking device which is capable of omitting a considerable part of hardware and increasing processing rate.
In image processing inclusive of character recognition and pattern recognition, image data are usually masked with a 3.times.3 or 5.times.5 matrix on a raster scan basis for removing noise, identifying contours, and other purposes.
While some masking approaches have heretofore been proposed, all of them have had many problems left unsolved such as low processing rates, intricate constructions and disproportionate number of structural elements.